News and analysis of critical issues in homeland security

May 1, 2013

In the April 30 Washington Post, back in the Style section with the comics and gossip, is a remarkable piece of long-form journalism every homeland security professional should read and be ready to discuss. The story’s substance is well within our domain. It is also wonderfully written. The writer has achieved a rhetoric that constantly reminds the reader, “this is one way of perceiving reality, there are others.”

Glad you read it. I had done my usual morning review of the Post website and missed this piece. Another reason I still like the paper.

So… I found myself very sympathetic to the co-conspirators AND they really do sound “a little batty” or more than a little AND prosecution is fully justified AND I am left wondering, worrying about what does Justice (with a capital) look like in a case like this?

Does this have implications for our counter-terrorist concepts and operations? Surely it must.

EPA speaks on how much radiation is too much
By Editorial Board,
Apr 29, 2013 11:54 PM EDT
The Washington Post Published: April 29
IMAGINE THAT the Boston bombers didn’t pack nails into pressure cookers but instead packed highly radioactive material. How would the government be responding?
Part of the answer might lie in a document the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued this month, suggesting guidelines on how state and local officials should deal with potentially toxic nuclear contamination from disasters such as dirty bombs, power plant failures and atomic bomb detonations.

And Fiscal Hawk the new EPA PAG document seems to be in use without any department or agency having noticed by reference its adoption in the Federal Register. FEMA in particular already using the document in training but as I have long advocated does not have the technical personnel with comprehensive understanding of radiation to implement it.